When Father's Day Hurts

June has always been a complicated month for me.

On one hand, it's a month filled with celebration. The school year winds down. Summer begins to peek around the corner. Families gather. Father's Day arrives.

But June is also my father's birthday month.

And for the past thirteen years, it has been a reminder of someone who should still be here.

As a therapist, I spend a great deal of time talking about grief. I sit with people through losses of all kinds. Yet what grief has taught me personally is that it doesn't follow rules. It doesn't disappear because enough time has passed. It doesn't care how much insight you have or how many books you've read.

My father died in 2013.

He was only in his fifties.

Even writing that feels strange.

He was the kind of person people naturally gravitated toward. Funny. Social. Warm. The kind of man who could walk into a room and have everyone laughing within minutes. He worked as a baker, which meant he worked nights for most of his life. We always had fresh bread at home, but it also meant sacrifices that many people never saw.

Family was everything to him.

Perhaps because he understood loss from the very beginning.

His mother died when he was a baby. Yet instead of growing up without love, he grew up surrounded by it. Extended family, neighbours, friends, and community members stepped in and helped raise him. He learned early that people take care of each other.

And in many ways, he spent the rest of his life trying to repay that gift.

He immigrated to Canada to create opportunities for his family. He worked hard. He sacrificed. He showed up.

What I remember most, though, isn't what he did.

It's who he was.

People often assume my mother was the emotional one in our family.

She wasn't.

My father was.

He was the one whose eyes would fill with tears when talking about his children. I remember going through my first real heartbreak. I wasn't crying.

He was.

That was my dad.

Strong and stubborn on the outside. Soft-hearted underneath it all.

It's funny what stays with us after someone dies.

I don't remember every conversation.

I don't remember every holiday.

But I remember laughing about the fact that he lived in Canada for decades without ever really learning English, yet somehow managed to learn every swear word imaginable.

I remember his sense of humour.

I remember his presence.

I remember feeling safe.

And I remember the things that came after he was gone.

Because that's the part nobody tells you about grief.

The loss itself is devastating.

But what follows can be equally painful.

It's every milestone.

Every success.

Every setback.

Every moment when you instinctively think, "I should call Dad."

It's watching your children grow and wondering what kind of relationship they would have had.

My oldest daughter was only three when he died. She has no real memories of him.

My son never had the chance to meet him at all.

Sometimes grief isn't about what happened.

Sometimes it's about everything that didn't.

The conversations that never happened.

The birthdays never celebrated.

The stories never shared.

The future that never arrived.

And perhaps that's why Father's Day can be so complicated.

For some people, Father's Day is joyful.

For others, it brings sadness.

For some, it highlights complicated relationships, estrangement, longing, infertility, or the loss of a child.

For others, it shines a light on someone they miss every single day.

The truth is that Father's Day isn't experienced the same way by everyone.

And that's okay.

There is room for gratitude and grief.

There is room for celebration and sadness.

There is room for laughter and tears.

Sometimes all at the same table.

If Father's Day feels difficult for you this year, I want you to know something.

You do not need to force yourself to feel differently.

You do not need to perform happiness.

You do not need to explain your grief to anyone.

You are allowed to miss them.

You are allowed to remember.

You are allowed to celebrate them.

You are allowed to cry.

And you are allowed to laugh at the memories that still make you smile.

Because grief isn't a sign that something is wrong.

It's often a reflection of how deeply we loved.

If there is one thing grief has taught me, it is this:

The people we love never completely leave us.

They remain in our stories.

In our habits.

In our laughter.

In the values they passed on.

In the parts of ourselves that they helped shape.

My father may no longer be here to celebrate another birthday in June.

But he is still here in countless other ways.

And maybe that's what remembering really is.

Not holding on.

But carrying forward.